The present invention relates to a radar beacon apparatus.
In a shipwreck, sufferers usually get in a lifeboat, however, the information of the position of the lifeboat may be lost. This is depending upon the weather condition and the sea condition at the shipwreck.
The lifeboat in the sea is quite small whereby it is not easily found from the rescue ship.
The lifeboat usually equips optical or acoustic signal devices such as a signal red flame, a signal with a parachute, a sunlight signal mirror, a light and a pipe as signal devices for rescue. These signal devices should be used under the decision made by the sufferers.
Recently, radio wave signal devices for rescue have been proposed to overcome the problem. It has been proposed to use a radio wave oscillating device which always sweeps in the frequency band zone for radars in ships and a repeater type radio wave oscillating device which automatically generates the corresponding rescue signal when the pulse radio wave of a radar in a ship is received.
When these devices are used, the sufferers can not know whether the rescue activity has started or not.
It is important from the viewpoint of the life saving, that the devices can be equipped with a large lifeboat, a life buoy for few persons or a life jacket, for a short time without failure and the devices should not have radio interference for transmitting and receiving and the devices should be durable, water resistant, air-tight and reliable.
However, a radar beacon apparatus having all of these characteristics have not been found. It is important to develop such apparatus from the viewpoint of speedy and precise rescue activity.